Each day we bring you one stunning little glimpse of history in the form of a historical photograph. Enjoy!

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Mexican Wealth

This picture was taken in about 1920, and shows the interior of a wealthy families home in Mexico. The stark contrast between this picture and the picture from yesterday illustrates one of the challenges in Mexico. There is not much of a Middle Class in Mexico. A few people are extremely wealthy, and then many, many desperately poor people. Perhaps now there is some emergence of a middle class in cities, but certainly in rural areas people are still living in abject poverty. A few years ago I had a chance to give a presentation at a University in Monterrey Mexico. About 2,000 students showed up for the talk, and after the talk I was literally mobbed by hundreds of students wanting to ask questions. I had never seen such enthusiasm from engineering students in this country. That experience gave me hope that perhaps young people there are appreciating the importance of higher education, and that through a number of excellent universities, Mexico will continue to build a broader professional workforce.

This could easily be one of the hotels we stayed at in either Morelia or Patzcuaro last Dias de los Muertos. Same for the previous street scene, except that the dress would be blue jeans and a short sleeved shirt.

The people we met may not have had many material goods, but poverty is not a word I would use in describing them.

I am a sucker for old photographs,as well as a lover of history so this is awesome. This picture is beautiful and this home is amazing,makes me wish I could travel back in time to just visit it...although I probably wouldn't want to live in those times,being a woman was hard back then -_-'

About Me

I grew up in West Texas, and could not wait to get away. I got away, and went to the University of Texas, and then on to Stanford. I saw the world, and decided what I really wanted was to be in West Texas. So here I am, right back where I started. I had it all, and found it was not that great.

I have been an avid collector of old photographs and documents for over 30
years. The photographs on this site are derived from material I have collected
over the years. Some came from old family albums, some from material I bought at
flea markets over the years, and some from government archives of public domain
images, including the US Library of Congress, and the National Archives. We
appreciate you visiting this blog, and hope you find it interesting.

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